SEARCH
REGION: POLAND
EN
PL

Coca-Cola HBC Austria enjoys successful partnership with CHG-MERIDIAN

Focus on sustainability

Coca-Cola products are some of the most recognizable in the world. Coca-Cola HBC Austria, a leading partner and licensed bottler for The Coca-Cola Company in Austria, has entered into a comprehensive IT support agreement with CHG-MERIDIAN. It all started with a small contract.

The multinational company based in Steinhausen, near Zug in Switzerland, is licensed to produce and bottle beverages for The Coca-Cola Company. In early 2020, CHG-MERIDIAN Austria was asked to provide a quotation for a customized business concept incorporating laptops and smartphones. 

Coca-Cola HBC Austria employs around 900 people at its headquarters in Vienna, at its sales outlets in the country’s federal states, and in its ultra-modern production and logistics center in Edelstal in the state of Burgenland. From here, the company supplies the whole of Austria and the surrounding markets with Coca-Cola products. Its corporate strategy includes the use of new technologies to simplify processes, reduce costs, increase speed, and improve sustainability. Another of the company’s aims is to support and develop its employees. “We want to create a working environment that allows our employees to reach their full potential,” says Ingeborg Tichy, Senior Buyer at Coca-Cola HBC Austria. 

 

When it comes to cutting-edge technology and a fast-changing working environment, CHG-MERIDIAN can offer suitable solutions, including the procurement of laptops and smartphones. The initial task was to put together the product line-up for the shopping cart and jointly select some of the suppliers, before producing a customized business concept.

Michael König, Vice President of Sales at CHG-MERIDIAN Austria
“The initial transition to our solution allowed Coca-Cola HBC to see how we work, how we implement our processes, and how we deliver an efficient and seamless system. And they liked what they saw,” reports Michael König, Vice President of Sales at CHG-MERIDIAN Austria. “Once the first orders were placed and experiences gained, we were quickly recommended to other departments and invited to present concepts from our industrial technologies business to decision-makers in the relevant divisions. This laid the foundations for expanding our partnership.”
Michael König, Vice President of Sales, CHG-MERIDIAN Austria

Next step: sustainability

Coca-Cola HBC Austria is now looking to benefit from a customized business concept for other asset classes, and will probably include server, storage, and network components alongside various mobile devices, laptops, PCs, TFT monitors, and hand-held scanners. In addition to the cost savings and increased efficiency offered by CHG-MERIDIAN, the option to operate these assets carbon-neutrally with carbonZER0 is a major plus as Coca-Cola HBC is committed to reducing its emissions to net zero throughout its value chain by 2040. 

Acting sustainably and responsibly has the highest priority at Coca-Cola HBC Austria. The company sees itself as a role model when it comes to sustainability, and ensures that conserving natural resources is at the heart of all its activities and decisions. These include environmentally friendly packaging, recycling, climate action, energy conservation, and the conservation of water and protection of water sources. CHG-MERIDIAN’s solution is the perfect fit for this. It extends the lifecycle of the IT equipment used at Coca-Cola HBC by refurbishing assets at CHG-MERIDIAN’s technology center in preparation for resale on the secondary market. The first step is to completely erase all data from the decommissioned PCs, laptops, and smartphones using CHG-MERIDIAN’s eraSURE®. This smart process for asset recycling and data erasure provides an audit trail and complies with established standards. The assets are then refurbished and remarketed. “CHG-MERIDIAN is a partner that shares our belief in the need for climate action and sustainability from start to finish,” explains Tichy. 

Transparency and efficiency with TESMA®

Coca-Cola HBC Austria recognized that the TESMA® management platform is the perfect complement to the hardware. The platform displays real-time administrative and technical information at a glance, and shows which devices are in use and where. This enables precise accounting and reporting for all technologies in use, which in turn makes the processes at Coca-Cola HBC Austria more efficient and cost-effective.  

Coca-Cola HBC Austria has also opted for the eProcurement module in TESMA®, which provides an independent platform with defined workflows for executing and documenting orders. Decision-makers at Coca-Cola HBC Austria can put the devices they need in a central shopping cart and place orders themselves. “This solution for managing the procurement and administration of a wide range of end devices is very useful, as it shows us who is using which devices across the company. The advice we received about introducing TESMA® is one of the reasons why CHG-MERIDIAN is more than just our partner for procuring and leasing hardware; we see the team at CHG-MERIDIAN as a highly valued innovation partner and trusted advisor,” states Christian Balenovic, Digital Workplace Technologies Manager, Region 1. 

The relationship between Coca-Cola HBC Austria and CHG-MERIDIAN has intensified, and the exchange of ideas generates value for both companies. The successful collaboration that began this year has laid the foundations for a long-term technology management partnership.  

Ingeborg Tichy, Senior Buyer at Coca-Cola HBC Austria

“CHG-MERIDIAN is a trusted advisor, helping us to find the right business concept, providing suitable solutions, and ensuring that devices can be used sustainably.”